I was called to the hospital after midnight last night due to my father suffering a massive blood clot in the lungs. At 4:15 am, my father told my mother to go home and sleep because church starts at 9:00 am today. My mother told him that there was no way that she was going to church and my father ended up quite perturbed.

They have no special callings at the moment! There is no compelling reason to be at church today except to wash away their sins!

After hearing this from my father, I had an overwhelming sense of gratitude for escaping the cult of the LDS church.

The social pressure of the LDS church is tremendous, isn't it?

Bad habits are hard to break.

Hope he's better soon.

Get bashed for skiing instead of going to church one week, next week DW has me leave church early to go to the store to pick up a cart of ingredients we were missing for our dinner tonight with company....

That's great that your wife has lightened up a little over the past week.

As for me, I wanted to take my mother out for dinner tonight but she refused due to it being the Sabbath. Perhaps it will be lunch tomorrow instead.

When my dad's hospital meal arrived, I grabbed the cup of black tea served with the meal to drink it. My parents were mortified. I thought nothing of it but regretted having it in front of them. My mother gave me a look as if I were being disrespectful by drinking it. Oh well.

Baby steps for these TBMs, right?

Ha ain't that the truth! It's funny the things that perturb TBM's.

Yet they won't condone "cafeteria" mormons. How does that make sense, we can't pick and choose commandments to follow, but you can pick and choose commandments to judge a person's worth by?

I sure hope your dad is ok paisley. Sorry for the unpleasant circumstance you are in =(

I'm so sorry that your dad is unwell. Serious illness tends to upset routines, and your dad may be having a hard time dealing with that. A sense of humor can take all of you a long way under the circumstances. "Dad, Heavenly Father can wait. You, on the other hand, cannot." Hang in there and do update us on your dad's progress.

I am sorry to hear about your father. If your father is like mine, retirement gives him so much time that the TSCC is not really a burden, time or financially. I have been thinking about writing a letter/email to my dad to explain how I started to not believe. It is not for me to justify my life away from the TSCC, but rather to help him see that he has been monumentally ignorant his entire life. A copy of the sermon about the mote and beam. The TSCC is a beam in their member's eyes... for the true Christian believers.

My father is the same way, he is a fanatic. He made sure not to miss church right after my birth. True f#cking story.

Well, today was a long day after a long night, but all is well. My dad is on blood thinners now. This episode comes after two heart attacks, a mini-stroke, and a benign tumor on his pituitary over the past five years.

Tonight he told me he wants a "do not resuscitate order" if there is a next time! I guess that he is now ready for his reward in heaven because he keeps saying "I am ready to go home". I teased him to make things right with God because there is roughly a 30% chance of death in the coming weeks. My mom responded, "Oh, he's ready!". Why wouldn't you want as much time possible on earth with family? I suppose he's been programmed to anticipate a great reward in heaven. Oh well.

Sometimes people get tired of dealing with serious health issues. They figure they've lived a full life, and they've had it. My mom had a DNR, but no one told me about that, and I was her caregiver! In the end, it didn't matter. Her body simply gave out. But she was ready. I used to think of it as, "her bags were packed."

I also had a pituitary tumor which was removed many years ago but did enough damage that I've had to take medications and scanning since then.

This is what ruined boy scouts for me. Scout troop had to be back from camping trips in time for church.

Dave the Atheist Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> This is what ruined boy scouts for me. Scout troop
> had to be back from camping trips in time for
> church.


Boy Scouts? We don't do that anymore.

Mormonism permeates every cell like some kind of parasite. You have reminded me as well why I also have "an overwhelming sense of gratitude for escaping the cult of the LDS church."

And I never want to hear that phrase again, "Heavenly Father needed your loved one more than you did."